Monday, December 10, 2007

Document Management Software - The Essential Investment For Any Business

Document Management Software - The Essential Investment For Any Business
Document management software is an essential investment for
any business handling large numbers of documents in a
networked system.

Document management software will enable your business to
function more effectively, saving staff time and creating a
document flow that works in harmony with the machines that
you run and network in your business environment.

There are many companies that specialise in creating
document management software suitable for a range of
purposes, including the creation of digital archives,
remote web access to documents and networking support.

You will find companies creating products designed for a
single user right through to large-scale, business-wide
deployment and they are renowned for their development
work, done as part of a consultative process with their
many users.

Document management software enables you to convert your
paper archive of documents into electronic versions and
then to continually extend this electronic archive during
the day-to-day life of your business.

The benefits of converting your paper documents into
digital versions are manifold and include easier storage;
easier retrieval; accessibility across your organisation;
the networked sharing of information to improve
communication; and efficiency within your business.

Filing electronic versions of your paper documents can also
help your business by enabling easy tracking of large
stores of documents and preventing the loss of paper
copies. An electronic archive is easy to manage, with the
right software, and documents can be located quickly. One
of the most obvious and immediately beneficial advantages
to converting your paper document archive to a digital
format is that of space-saving. You will instantly gain
space in your office and the need for large-scale storing
cabinets with mass archives will be eliminated.

In order to create an electronic document archive, you will
need a scanner and some document management software. The
archive is created by the scanning of paper documents, with
your document management software then enabling you to
store these documents on a hard drive or disk, as you
prefer.

Following scanning and storage, your documents are indexed
in an archive format. Future retrieval of these documents
is easily enabled via your document management software.
Your document management software will also enable you to
set different levels of access and document editing rights
for individual users across your network, so you can
customise the security of your archive to suit your
business and employee needs.

Quality document management software allows you to grow and
extend your electronic archive well into the future and
means that you can continually add to your electronic
document archive with a modular approach. Such software
will also enable you to allow controlled access to your
document archive from within your office environment, on a
multi-location network or using online methods, for staff
working remotely. Once you have decided that your
business can really benefit from investment in document
management software and accessories, there are a number of
other factors to consider. It is a very good idea, and key
to making the right investment for your business, to take
some time to plan through how your particular needs can be
met by document management software and what your future
requirements might be.

Consider factors like the number of currently archived
paper documents that your new electronic archive will need
to store and approximately how many new documents may be
added over a 12-month period. You should also plan out
roughly how many users will need access to the system,
whether there will be public access and how much control
you will need to have over user rights and permissions.

Obviously, there are then also technical considerations,
such as the current specification of your network
capabilities and any existing scanning machinery you have.
Depending on the size of your business, it can be a good
idea to pool resources and skills to create a document
management software requirements list, as you will need to
consider administrative, technical and, possibly, legal
requirements before you go ahead and create your new
electronic archive.


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with unrivalled customer service and support. The company
also offers customers a regular newsletter, featuring new
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and solutions available from ABT can be viewed online -
http://www.ricoh-photocopiers.co.uk

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